He Wei, vice-chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), recently led a survey on the protection and development of marine resources in the coastal province of Zhejiang from June 11 to 15. 

The survey team listened to a Zhejiang provincial government report and visited cities including Ningbo and Zhoushan, made field trips to  a number of marine-related enterprises and scientific research institutions, fisheries and petrochemical bases, as well as LHD marine tidal power generation projects and key ports and wharves. They also listened to suggestions from industrial insiders.

He affirmed the achievements made by Zhejiang in promoting the protection and development of marine resources. He pointed out that cultivation of a powerful maritime industry is a major policy worked out by the CPC Central Committee. The protection and development of marine resources is of great significance to protecting the marine ecology, developing the marine economy, building China into a powerful marine country, and realizing the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation. He called for making marine resources protection and development a national-level task.

He stressed prioritizing ecological protection and strengthening the construction of marine ecological civilization; transforming exploitation of marine resources from an extensive model to an economical and intensive one which values quality for economic benefits; and implementing the new development concept, striving to build a modern marine industrial system, breaking through the bottleneck of core marine technology, and adhering to overall protection and rational development, so as to make the ocean a high-quality development highland.

It takes a long time to build a strong maritime country. In 2018, the Committee on Population, Resources and Environment of the CPPCC National Committee carried out surveys in Shandong and Fujian provinces on marine resources protection and development, and submitted reports to the central government with some of the suggestions in the reports adopted by the government.

Considering that it is now a critical time for the formulation of the 14th Five-Year Plan (2021-2025), the National Committee of the CPPCC decided to carry out in-depth surveys on the "coordinated promotion" of marine resource protection and development in Hainan province and Zhejiang. A survey in Hainan was completed in early June.

In addition, the topic of marine resource protection and development will be discussed at a bi-weekly consultative seminar of the CPPCC National Committee scheduled for late October.